Milo Erwin’s “History of Williamson County”, published in 1875 details the first murders occurring here and types of crime in the county up to about 1874.
“I estimate the number of assaults to murder that have occurred in this county at 285. Assaults with a deadly weapon, at 495; larceny, 190; rape, 15; burglary, 22; perjury, 20.
The first homicide occurred in 1813. Thomas Griffee was trying to shoot a bear out of a tree where the old court house burned down in Marion, and he saw an Indian aiming his gun at the same bear. Griffee leveled his rifle at the Indian and shot him dead.
The next murder occurred in 1814. Thomas Griffee had a man working in a saltpeter cave for him, by the name of Eliott, who was a little colored. He came into Griffee’s one Saturday night, and a surveyor by the name of John Hicks raised a fuss with him, and stabbed and killed him.
Hicks then ran away, and at that moment a band of Indians came up to Griffee’s from the camp at Bainbridge, and wanted to go in pursuit of Hicks, but Griffee would not let them go.
Next morning Griffee and John Phelps started in pursuit of Hicks; they came on to him at the Odum Ford, and Hicks snapped his gun at Griffee’s breast, but was taken. They took him to Kaskaskia, where the nearest Justice of the Peace lived, and he was whipped, cropped and branded, and let go.”
Sam’s Notes: The old court house referenced was in the southeast corner of the Square where the Salvation Army currently resides in the place of the old Cox Hardware business. Of course this murder occurred 26 years before Marion existed.
According to Irwin, Thomas Griffee wasn’t the kind of man who would hesitate to kill an Indian. He presumably had a reputation as such and most Indians had the sense to steer clear of him.
I wasn’t familiar with “cropping” as a form of punishment so I looked it up. Cropping is the removal of one or both ears, either by cutting them off or nailing them to a pillory (post) and having the criminal’s movement rip them loose. Neither one sounds very pleasant.
(Extracted from Milo Erwin’s History of Williamson County, 1875)